The Secret Behind The Secret

The #1 bestselling book in America is a 216-page volume called The Secret, based on a DVD of the same title. “Truly life-changing information,” exclaims the publisher on Amazon.com. “A new era for humankind,” exults the web site. “This is The Secret to everything — the secret to unlimited joy, health, money, relationships, love, youth: everything you have ever wanted. […] [It] utterly transformed the lives of every person who ever knew it… Plato, Newton, Carnegie, Beethoven, Shakespeare, Einstein.”

What is this incredible secret? Namely, that the universe is governed by a heretofore unknown Law of Attraction, as yet undiscovered by conventional physicists, that the world rearranges itself to conform to your thoughts. Or, as one proponent put it, the universe “is akin to a big mail-order department,” in which you “‘order’ what you get by sending energetic messages out to the universe.”

This stuff is so blatantly absurd that it’s not really worth debunking. And it’s silly enough that Barbara Ehrenreich has already written the definitive mockery (“Thoughts exert a gravitational-type force on the world, so that ‘whenever you think something, the thought immediately attracts its physical equivalent.’ If you think money — in a totally urgent, focused and positive way, of course — it will come flying into your pockets.”). Twice (“I don’t have to write this blog, I can simply visualize it already written — or could, if I’d bothered to read the whole book and finish the DVD.”)

But, drawing on some of Ehrenreich’s other work, I’d like to discuss they why of this book. The book’s success is easy enough to explain. As the Canadian publisher put it in an interview with the Toronto Star, “Basically, human beings are lazy. If you tell them you can get rich just by thinking about it, obviously, they’re going to buy it.”

But these books also have a more insidious effect. As Ehrenreich notes, by making your lack of wealth and a good job into personal problems, you discourage people from looking at the social systems that created and sustained those problems. By telling them their thoughts control the universe, you can persuade them to do things like — as one Secret-endorsing book encouraged — “Place your hand on your heart and say … ‘I admire rich people!’ ‘I bless rich people!’ ‘I love rich people!’ ‘And I’m going to be one of those rich people too!’”

And, in reverse, by telling people that bad things are caused by their negative thoughts, you get to persuade them to stop thinking about bad things. “I’m a really big believer in The Secret,” a young black woman recently explained at a Secret-related book reading. “But I also believe that discrimination and racism are real. How can you harmonize those things?”

“You just said you believe in discrimination,” explained the guru. “You be-live it. I’m going to ask you to stop believing it, because if you focus on the negative, you project it yourself.”

That’s right — if you stop believing in the existence of discrimination, it’ll stop happening to you. No need to fight to end it! Those black people banned from lunch counters in the South? They weren’t simply believing hard enough. Those studies showing that resumes with black-sounding names on them received far fewer callbacks as identical ones with white-sounding names? The researchers didn’t take into account their thoughtwaves.

Following this idea goes to some pretty dark places and the authors take it all the way. “I really love what you’re doing,” said a young man at the same event. “But how, for example, was 9/11 attracted to the people in those buildings? That’s something I can’t understand.”

“Sometimes, we experience the law of attraction collectively,” explains the guru. “The US maybe had a fear of being attacked. Those 3,000 people — they might have put out some kind of fear that attracted this to happen, fear of dying young, fear that something might happen that day. But sometimes, it is collective.”

When you manage to convince people that even getting murdered is their own fault, you’ve truly found the secret of success. For the already powerful, that is.

Comments

I find your term “absurd” very interesting — telling that you don’t even attempt to disprove The Secret. Because you can’t. Your desire to disprove The Secret causes an attraction of lack of evidence to you. Obviously you must believe in The Secret for evidence of the truth of The Secret to be attracted to you. You are so closed-minded, not to mention arrogant. You think you are based on “reason” and “evidence” yet you cannot see that you have not and can never disprove The Secret.

I would assert that strongly held beliefs can “open and close doors” in our lives. Actively changing beliefs can have very positive consequences.

I used to believe the world owed me a certain amount of success, happiness, and pleasure. I actively rid myself of that belief, some doors leading to painful and futile behavior were closed, and some doors leading to fruitful and fulfilling thoughts and activity were opened.

I now believe (decided to believe, and labor to believe) that the only thing worth calling free-will is action that takes a person away from comfort, to the edge of a person’s “comfort zone” and a measured bit beyond, in a direction informed by communication with the person I feel I should be, 5 to 10 years in the future (my future “higher self”). Obviously, I also have to believe I have ability to communicate with a future self, one that shares my personal history, but has broken through some of my current limitations.

For example, I contemplate my limited access to the facts of my past, since it is mainly only available to me through imperfect human recollection. Contemplating this limited access makes communicating with my future self through a “temporal haze” seem less fantastic. And other mental exercises like this. (Another example: imagining a dialog with myself as I was 5 years ago, as preparation for a third actor to join the dialog, myself 5 years in the future.)

Now I will quickly play “devil’s advocate” for the examples you gave.

‘I admire rich people!’ ‘I bless rich people!’ ‘I love rich people!’

It is possible despising rich people might make a person feel conflicted while working to provide outstanding value to customers in a capitalist arena. You would lose the edge to work hard to provide outstanding value, and you would then miss the opportunity to be financially rewarded (with outstanding renumeration).

“But I also believe that discrimination and racism are real.”

Believing that discrimination and racism were purely imagined might give a young black woman the courage to put her whole talents for display, because she will be unafraid that they will be rejected because she is black. When she is rewarded (probably less than a white man would be rewarded, but still rewarded), her gains are very real, and they will also give her more courage to push further. But those real gains came from believing a falsehood.

(I will skip the 9/11 example, because it is as thickly stupid as a migraine. My ability to play devil’s advocate only stretches so far.)

My point is that individuals can sometimes gain individual success by denying social truths.

My point is that the strategies for individual success and strategies for success for a whole social/economic group (a traditionally disadvantaged group), those two types of strategies frequently class, if not absolutely clash.

What I see as a typical reason: individual success is often based on value creation; success for a whole social/economic group is often political and based on re-partitioning finite wealth and so is zero-sum.

I am leading to a question. I don’t remember ever reading an answer to this question.

Is there any way to reconcile individual gain and social/economic gain for a disadvantaged group? Any way besides applying fractions of one’s energies? (I will spend 40% of my energy on political solutions, and 40% of my energy on value creation, and the remaining 20% enforcing partitions in my life to deal with the frequent clashes of identity. With some “task switching” algorithm so that neither is short-changed, and I get maximal effectiveness from the fractional energy.)

Surely the “golden middle” will have some of one’s energies toward the political, and some of one’s energies toward value creation, and necessarily some of one’s energies toward maintaining identity through contradictions of thought and activity (and some energy going towards “task switching” and effective time allocation). But nobody seems to talk about working on applying this allotment of energies thoughtfully and systematically. Nobody I ever remember reading.

Unless you are talking about the outrageously wealthy spending money, spending money only in their later years, spending money that has no risk of diminishing their standard of living, and spending money on a limited number of social goals (absolutely no social goals that put the current power distribution at risk).

(Sidenote: are value creation and political activism really in conflict? Activities that satisfy both simultaneously seem to be few. Surely, the world could not support hundreds of thousands of stimulating, provoking, readable political essayists. I am also interested in learning more activities that simultaneously create value and promote a worth political cause. Are they numerous enough to engage a whole citizenry?)

Why is an ordinary person with active value creation goals and active political goals so invisible? My guess is that such a person working to such a mixture of goals would be a very strange bird. And this person would be maximally politically useless and maximally politically inconvenient. There would be absolutely no political gain (anywhere to anybody) from promoting such a way of living one’s life.

I see nothing wrong with any effort that convinces people to take responsibility for their own lives.

To blame everyone but oneself for one’s problems, or to spend one’s life trying to remove the mote from a neighbor’s eye while ignoring the beam in one’s own, simply perpetuates the most vicious of vicious circles. Resentment begets resentment.

Yes, people do suffer innocently. There is racism. There is terrorism. There is crime. But the only sufferings that matter are the sufferings of the soul, and these can only be self-inflicted. Our own wickedness is what we should fear, not that of others. This is the message of most of the world’s spiritual traditions, both secular and sacred.

Books like “The Secret” may not be sophisticated, but they are saying nothing more than what the wise have always known. Sophistication usually does more to delay the coming of wisdom than to hasten it; the wise have always known that, too.

Note: I agree with your general take that the premise of the Secret is absurd. But, like many of these phenomena there is a small grain of truth which can be dredged from it all. The essential ideas, which can be found more transparently and eloquently said elsewhere, are the following:

1) Goal focus is important - those with particular and explicit goals in mind tend to succeed at those goals more than those who don’t, simply because they devote their energies toward steps activities get them toward their goal. This is somewhat obvious, but it bears repeating, since many don’t think in this manner.

2) Persistence is important - those who persist in a particular goal are more likely to achieve than those who don’t, or who give up in the face of initial failures/setbacks. Again, somewhat self evident, but worth explicitly stating.

3) Internal and External Self-confidence is important — to the extent that the secret gives individuals self-confidence, however falsely so, they are more likely to reach their goals if they believe in it and, more importantly, are able to convince others to believe in it to. Achieving a particular goal requires the help of many others, and, consequently, the ability to persuade others that your ideas and goals are realistic and attainable. This “Law of Attraction” is sort of pseudo-babble proxy for increasing one’s chance of internal and external self-confidence.

Now, I am not one who advocates engaging in self-deception merely to get certain beneficial outcomes (assuming that the above identified traits will result from the self-deceptive act of believing in the law of attraction). This smacks of the argument that believing in god is good, even if untrue, because it causes individuals to behave more charitably. But, then again, we all engage in self-deception to some degree….

We all know you’re part of the vast subversive conspiracy (along with Ehrenreich, the Communist party, and Emo bands) to keep people from the truth, “negativizing” their thought-waves so they will never find “unlimited joy, health, money, relationships, love, youth.” Indeed, given your material success, it’s obvious you’ve been applying the Law of Attraction all along.

On a more serious note:

Seth: Unfortunately, people are not strictly rational :-(.

Why is this a bad thing, and what do you mean by “strictly rational?”

HS: Goal focus is important - those with particular and explicit goals in mind tend to succeed at those goals more than those who don’t, simply because they devote their energies toward steps activities get them toward their goal.

The most goal-oriented people I know are hosers who want to be i-bankers and financial consultants. I suppose if you consider success on their terms, then they’re most successful, but on mine, they’re wasting their lives.

Kermit Snelson: Books like “The Secret” may not be sophisticated, but they are saying nothing more than what the wise have always known. Sophistication usually does more to delay the coming of wisdom than to hasten it; the wise have always known that, too.

There’s a new documentary series from Adam Curtis on how our concept of ‘freedom’ has changed in the west from WW2 to the present. It goes some way to drawing out the context for the rise of the self help industry. It’s called The Trap.

It seems to be available on GoogleVideo. You’re looking for 3 one hour segments. If it disappears, try archive.org. Several older Curtis docs are available there. (“Power of Nightmares: the politics of fear” is a personal favourite.)

Jacob: People make certain kinds of thinking errors that are well-understood, but unfortunately understanding them doesn’t help much (a little, but not a whole lot). Look up “behavioral finance” for one examination, which is applying congitive psychology to what people actually do in investing.

So you get lottery-like outcomes, with a few big winners, lots of participants losing everything, and instead of saying “It’s a lottery. Maybe we should organize society more evenly”, they say “Think happy thoughts about winning the lottery. Think real real hard about it”.

Some of this comes from the fact that the big winners then get to hire clever people to push the idea of “Lottery winners deserve it, and how you can be one too”. And so there’s a feedback effect there. But the big problem is that even knowing the thinking problem doesn’t give you much of handle on how to approach dealing with it on a societal level.

You wrote “The most goal-oriented people I know are hosers who want to be i-bankers and financial consultants. I suppose if you consider success on their terms, then they’re most successful, but on mine, they’re wasting their lives.”

I agree completely. The point isn’t the worthiness of their goals. It’s a much simpler point — almost too self-evident to state — those who have goals, and focus their energies toward those goals tend to achieve those goals more than those who don’t.

If somebody’s goal is financial wealth, the person who single-mindedly devotes their energy toward becoming an investment banker as a means of achieving wealth is more likely to be wealthy than a person who haphazardly hopes for wealth.

This is ultimately a different question from whether the goals themselves are worthy. I agree that many super goal-oriented individuals are doggedly pursuing goals that I don’t consider very meaningful. However, everyone’s preferences are individualized, so what is right for me is not necessarily right for others.

Thus, to the extent we can draw any “wisdom” out of the Secret, this is one — if you have a particular goal, you’re more likely to achieve that goal by pursuing it actively, and letting people know that you are pursuing this goal.

Not a very compelling point, but it does seem to underlie the premise of the movie.

the trouble with the secret, and working individually, is that while one’s own wishes can sometimes feel like magic, the benefits that accrue from helping other people’s wishes come true almost always feel like magic. this is why people band together and it’s caused by how dominated our conscious thoughts are by our anxieties, which blind us to the generally helpful and positive aspects of our communities.

(this is funny because just this morning i wrote a long thing about how we’d wished ourselves out of nature, and poof, we got our wish. “now what, geniuses?”)

To gauge the lameness of any self-help offer, just look to see if they equate happiness with the accumulation of money. The more money they imply you’ll get, and the faster you’ll get it, the lamer the offer.

Likewise any offer that tells you you’ll get something “because you deserve it.”

There are certainly some people who can really benefit from breaking out of personal or societal bonds that hamper them. But for most people, the real “secret” to being happy is to decide to be happy.

WOW!!!
Who care’s about who believes in ”the secret” or anything else for that matter! The good opinion of people just does not matter. Who are they anyway…? Nobody and every body. If any person has to give a belief in anything to the public it is because of their own fears. Do not take anyone’s opinion except as worthless, just believe in yourself. Useless and meaningless opinions are a set up to put you down, useful and good opinions should lift you up, and these people who are negative by nature and should be avoided.

If I lived in the year 1850 and told a story about wavelengths of energy creating images in my minivan navigating me through the world on a system created called GPS. That would be so absurd to these people and even the language I would use or even a photograph of the automobile would look like an abstract painting. They could not understand what they see with their limited understanding of creation.

The people who have anything negative to say about the secret have a limited understanding in their minds of what is the future. The fears they hold and the ways they know are under attack and their fear of the possibilities of our future being so simple is threatening them and their limited minds and belief system’s. They just do not know of what they speak and that is why the speak and live in criticism and fear.

I do not believe Christ was anymore than any of us but I do not say that Christ or Catholicism is not true. My opinion in that matter just does not matter to anyone and should not. So let it be said that what matters the most is what you believe in. Do not share with the negative world a positive way of life. Hard work is whose law? I see many people who work very little for lots of money. I see lots of people work very hard for little money. Money favors no person, nor can money give love. So believe in the secret and don’t believe in the secret, just keep it to yourself and know that if someone has to give their opinion do not believe them because they are coming from a hollow and painful place that when they speak their main purpose is to put you down and seeing you fail is their goal.

Thus, to the extent we can draw any “wisdom” out of the Secret, this is one — if you have a particular goal, you’re more likely to achieve that goal by pursuing it actively, and letting people know that you are pursuing this goal.

Kind of a truism, no? I mean, I hope most people don’t need to read a book to figure this out…

I had cancer once, and a friend of mine looked me in the eyes and asked, “What have you done to bring this into your life?” and I paused a moment and said, “Do you mean what have I done to bring into my life people who could ask such a question of a cancer patient?”

The problem with The Secret is that it is true. For thousands of years, we who have lived by it have been trying to teach it to the rest of you. The only reason it appears to be a “secret” is the fact that so few people actually apply it.

Aaron - you’re bang on with your criticism of the Secret. I’m appalled by how many people have bought into it. That’s why I wrote The Happy Neurotic: How Fear and Angst Can Lead to Happiness and Success http://www.thehappyneurotic.com

The premise is that you can be productive, happy and well-adjusted while remaining as neurotic as ever. I think fear and angst are great motivators. The belief that negativity will bring down terrible karma on your sorry ass is totally misguided. If you use your fear to motivate you to take action you can do amazing things.

Many self-help books promise us wealth, perfect health, and even to reverse the aging process if only we love ourselves, say positive affirmations, and eliminate all negativity. But most of us aren’t getting any richer, healthier or younger, and we’re starting to feel like idiots as we go around chanting, ‘I am a perfect being of love and light’ while cutting people off in traffic.’

You have already made for yourself what it is that you wish.

Quantum physics is real… A thought does birth action in your body. Good thoughts bring good feelings and actions thus good health (less stress) and a higher success rate if you so desire. The Universe does not listen but in a sense, it feels. Although a grain of sand we are, so thus is a quark to an atom. But, then I ask, what binds it all? Energy, yes? Ay, theres the rub. The Universe feels… I think. Energy is its tentacles.

I cannot say that “The Secret” is true or not. All I know is that when I was told passionately by my friend about it, I felt really good and I accomplished more goals and started new ones with fervor. One can not judge this just by a movie (perhaps that is why you are disturbed, because they made money off of people buying it?), but must try for themselves. But if you do not believe, then you will not know.

If we are to deny truths but have only beliefs then we will never advance as a society to any level but only digress.

We will know more and see more in the future when we are ready for it. I have hope that you will as well.